Feeding you nourishing information one bite at a time

Lesson 2: When do you eat?

The words for specific meals of the day can be translated as the word for “meal” (bưa ăn or bữa cơm) + the time of day. In the previous lesson, we learned that the word ăn means to eat. The word cơm means rice, which is traditionally eaten at almost every meal.

Oftentimes, I’ll have to ask questions about when and how often. So here’s a list of some new vocabulary.

Hungry

đói

Thirsty

khát

Day

ngày

Week

tuần

Month

tháng

Before

trước khi

After

sau khi

Now

bây giờ

1:00 am

một giờ sang

2:30pm

hai giờ ba mươi chiều

Sometimes

thỉnh thoảng

Often

thường, hay, luôn

Never

không bao giờ

All the time

luôn luôn or lúc nào cũng

Need a review on numbers and time? Try the Vietnamese phrasebook on WikiTravel or if you’re more of an auditory learner, search for “Vietnamese numbers” or “Vietnamese time” on YouTube.

Related sample dialogue

Do you eat breakfast?

(Bạn) có ăn sáng?

When?

Lúc nào?

Every day

Hằng ngày or mỗi ngày

Four times a day

Bốn lần mỗi ngày

I eat breakfast around 7:00 am.

(Tôi) ăn sang khoảng bảy giơ sáng.

I don’t eat lunch.

(Tôi) không ăn trưa.

Are you hungry?

(Bạn) có đói (không)?

Are you thirsty?

(Bạn) khát (không)?

I am hungry.

(Tôi) đói.

Không is your go-to negative (e.g. no, not, etc). You can also add it to the end of your sentences to turn them into questions.

I put the pronouns in parenthesis because your relationship to the person you are addressing determines what pronoun you use to refer to yourself and them. If you need a review on this subject, try the Wiki page on pronouns or again do a search on YouTube.